Once again one of Glasgow’s smallest venues throws a great lineup our way. Psychostick are wrapping their festival appearance at Amplified with a (large) handful of UK dates, with Glasgow being the farewell hoorah before flying back to the land of deep-fried trans-fats. As is common for Audio, the offer was thrown open for local support to open the show and this time we got two such bands.

House of Hatchets

First up were House of Hatchets from the far distant climes of the other end of the M8 – Edinburgh. Billed as “hard-hitting alt-metal”, they started fairly well and just got better as they went on. With some good rhythms and a handful of the crowd on their side from the off, they built and built as the set progressed and finished incredibly strongly. Songs played included current single “Sleep” as well as new songs “Epitaph” and “Burn” (apologies to the band if I misheard these), the last of which managed to kick off a fairly violent 3-person pit at the front of the stage.

Ross was very impressed by Darkness Divine‘s recent single “Digression” which, as it happens, was probably the best track they played tonight, using it to round off their set. They definitely brought some home support in, getting huge cheers from the off. It took little encouragement from singer Toni Benedetti-Martin to have the crowd punch the air, clap their hands and sing along.

Darkness Divine

In honesty, I found them talented but a little formulaic… right up until “Digression” which really did get my interest. If this is the direction the band are heading in now, then they deserve your interest. Their new EP is out in September and they’re already selling tickets for the launch party at Ivory Blacks. In a similar vein to today’s host venue, they’ve got an opening slot up for grabs – a nice gesture. Maybe you know of a band who could benefit?

Psychostick are on the cusp of announcing a new album (details on their Twitch channel at something like 2am on the 25th), but tonight they were playing older material – of which they have a lot. Plenty of songs were crammed into their hour-long set, along with plenty of stupid, silly, immature gigs. You know, the kind of stuff we love them for.

They celebrated everything from beards to beer, Bruce Campbell to orgasms. We learned that their car is a piece of shit, and that you can replace the word “sandwich” in a song with “haggis” and it still scans. Also that “Circle Pit To Nothing” is a great album title… and something that a Glasgow crowd will do between songs. Mind, the pit for “Danger Zone” pretty much lived up to the song’s title.

Psychostick

As ever, the setlist wasn’t set in stone, with a couple of tracks plucked at random from a lucky dip by audience members. There are a few bands who “take requests” by getting the audience to shout out titles, but let’s be honest – they end up playing the one they’ve got lined up. Psychostick for all their lunacy at least don’t cheat.

While many in the crowd yelled for “one more tune” at 10pm, the doors opened and most headed outside into the relative cool. Audio had been a little acoustically perfect sweatbox for a couple of hours and several dozen sweaty metalheads camped themselves on the pavements to chill out after an evening of great music and belly laughs.